When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go
by TeamImprov
Summary: When Jack finally returns from his assignment to take down Tiberius Kovacs, he learns very quickly that the mission left him with invisible scars, but it's the person he cares about most who ends up suffering for it. Can Mac forgive him, can he forgive himself?


Title from Bury a Friend by Billie Eilish

Prompt from bands-space-and-monsters-oh-my on tumblr: Strangulation? Please? Leaving marks of fingers on his neck?

-You got it! I took this in a rather dark direction, I hope that's okay! Haha! Thank you for the prompt!

**Trigger warning for the death of child soldiers; it's not graphic but please proceed with caution if you think that might bother you. **

Summary: When Jack finally returns from his assignment to take down Tiberius Kovacs, he learns very quickly that the mission left him with invisible scars, but it's the person he cares about most who ends up suffering for it. Can Mac forgive him, can he forgive himself?

**When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go**

It took eleven months, twenty-six days, seventeen hours, fourteen minutes, and fifty-eight seconds before Jack could see his family again.

He had been deployed for much longer than that before. His resume was full of long missions for the CIA, and even longer deployments with his Delta Unit. Hell, the last time he had been tasked with killing the terrorist he had been gone longer than it took them this time.

This one hurt the most, though. He had grown so accustomed to being around Mac every day and watching him build his little paperclip thingies as he explained some kind of complicated theorem Jack didn't understand. He had formed a habit a few years after meeting the blond-haired genius. Any time Mac excitedly explained something science-y or math-y to him, Jack would always make a mental note to remember whatever it was and then after the mission he would go home and google it. He would try to learn as much as he could so he could try to understand Mac's world a little better. He loved the way the kid thought, how passionate and excited he would get about things that most people found boring or dull.

Jack wasn't stupid; he wouldn't have the resume he did if he was. He liked to pretend he didn't care, and would mix up words on purpose to rile the kid up – it was so bizarre, every other bomb nerd Jack had ever met needed complete silence to focus while Mac seemed to thrive when there were a million distractions going on around him. Jack had to admit, though, he'd learned a lot since getting paired up with Mac all those years ago in the Sandbox.

He missed Riley, too, and their pizza and skee ball lunches. It had been painful to leave when Riley was a kid, but it was so much harder to go this time. He missed Bozer and Matty, the Phoenix and going on missions with his family. Jack had done a lot of things, been to incredible places and worked with the best of the best but this team, this family – his wolf pack – was the best thing that had ever happened to him. Having to walk away from them, for an unknown amount of time, with the possibility that he might never make it back, or worst of all – he might come back and find out one of them, or all of them, had been killed on a mission – was the hardest thing he had ever had to do.

They got lucky.

That's all there was to it. The mission was over in just under a year because Kovacs got sloppy – once. That's all it took. Jack liked to complain that working EOD was the slowest and most boring assignment you could have but in reality it was constant surveillance. It was sitting in windows on empty skyscraper floors that were being remodeled, and on rooftops with the sun beating down on you, or tucked away on hillsides for days and weeks and months at a time while you waited for the perfect opportunity to take someone dangerous out of the picture. It took failed missions, and close calls, and a few unfortunate civilian casualties but it was finally over, and Jack told himself every day that it was all worth it for the amount of lives they had saved taking Kovacs out of the equation.

When they got home, before he could return to the Phoenix Foundation and his family, he had been in a two week debrief but when they finally let him go he couldn't get back fast enough. Matty was the only one who knew he was home and she had gathered everyone to the war room under the pretense of another mission briefing. The moment he opened the door he saw them, their backs to the door as they waited for the briefing to begin. Matty saw him first and smiled warmly.

"Late as usual, Dalton, keep that up and I'm gonna start docking your pay."

Jack watched as everyone turned around, shock written all over their faces when they saw him. He had expected Riley to be the first one to fling her arms around him and was surprised when Mac stumbled forward, face pale and bright blue eyes misted over as he reached out a tentative hand toward Jack, it was as if he was afraid Jack actually being there was simply a hallucination – a mirage that would disappear as soon as he got too close.

"Hey, kid." Jack said, his voice breaking on the term of endearment he hadn't been able to use in so long - too long.

It was like hearing Jack's voice broke Mac out of his daze and Jack almost lost his balance when Mac grabbed him with both arms and pulled him in close. It was so reminiscent of the way Jack had hugged the kid when he was drugged with truth serum and thought Mac was dead for a few terrifying seconds. For a moment, Jack was afraid that maybe Mac had been drugged, too, but that didn't make any sense so he let himself relax. He could feel Mac trembling as his hands gripped the back of Jack's jacket tight.

"I'm back, kid, I'm back." Jack said, so glad he was finally able to say those words. They had been very thorough in making sure Kovacs was actually dead this time. They were not going to have another repeat of this fiasco and he was never leaving his family again. They belonged together – saving the world and watching each other's backs and having Die Hard marathons and drinking beer by the fire pit.

"I missed ya, big guy." Came Mac's hoarse reply.

"Me too, kid, I missed all of you so much." He smiled when Bozer and Riley jumped in, one on each side of Mac as they locked Jack in a cage of arms. He nodded his thanks to Desi, who was standing with Matty by the couch, and she winked in returned. She had held up her end of the deal and had kept his team safe. Her debt was settled and he would forever be grateful for her help.

He had never felt so happy in his life – yeah, it was good to be home.

Jack didn't realize how much the mission had affected him until he had been home for four days, nineteen hours, ten minutes, and fifteen seconds – when the first nightmare hit.

Things went pretty smooth for the first six months. The mission was uneventful, slow moving, and almost boring. There was a lot of waiting, a lot of watching, and a lot of trying not to think about the life he left behind.

Things didn't go FUBAR until they caught their first real break. They had lost Kovacs' location. Up until that point, they had always had a general idea of where he might be, and spent countless amounts of time scouting out every possible location, but then – all of a sudden – the trail went completely cold.

That was until Intelligence picked up heat signatures in an old industrial building in Syria – one of the last known locations the terrorist was thought to have been. When they finally got in country and set up surveillance, it was decided that it was as good a place as any to try to try to pull of an infiltration and take down.

Going in went as smoothly as one could hope for, but as soon as they got inside they quickly learned that Kovacs wasn't there but some of his men were and they had recruited kids, some no older than eight or nine, into their militia.

Things went south pretty quickly when Kovacs' men ordered the terrified kids to open fire on Jack's team. When they were too afraid to move, the terrorist took them out first, before opening fire. It was brutal, and bloody, and at one point Jack had been able to sneak around the terrorists and took one down. He got the man behind a bunch of crates used to store caches of stolen weapons and he made sure the man's death was as slow and painful as possible.

"You sick bastard, you killed kids," Jack seethed as he choked the life out of the man and watched the light fade from his bloodshot eyes. "You killed little kids!"

Mac felt like he could breathe again now that Jack was back.

He liked Desi, she was incredibly skilled and as badass as they come, but there was no substitute for your best friend and brother. It wasn't lost on anyone in the team, especially not Mac, with how lucky they were Jack was able to return in less than a year.

Honestly, it was just nice to have the whole thing behind them. Now they could move on with their lives and things could go back to normal. Mac was an expert at adapting, improvising was literally his thing, but there were some things he needed to stay the same. The team being together was one of those things - more like the top of his list, most important thing he could possibly think of.

Jack had been back for a few days and he had spent half of them sleeping on Mac's couch. Mac knew Jack didn't want to be alone in his empty apartment right now. He felt the same way after he was discharged from the Army. He was so relieved to have Bozer as a roommate when he came back, to have someone from his regular life around, and so every night when they drank beer around the fire pit long into the night telling stories of their adventures and catching up, Mac was always the one to suggest Jack stay over instead of driving home so late. So far, Jack had agreed without argument every time.

Everything was fine until the fifth morning when Mac woke up just as the sun was rising, before Jack or Bozer were up, and walked into the living room to find Jack tossing and turning on the couch, clearly distressed and in the throes of a violent nightmare.

Mac frowned. I wasn't the first time one of them had had nightmares. Unfortunately it was all too common in their line of work, with their histories. They had a pretty good routine for how to wake each other up, though, that was one of the benefits of experience.

Mac carefully made his way to the end of the couch, where Jack's feet were, and nudged the side of the couch with his foot. When that didn't work, he reached out and grabbed onto the back of the couch, still far away from Jack's reach and shook a little harder.

"Jack, wake up." Mac said clearly, making sure Jack could hear his voice and tell that it was him. That usually worked…

Mac didn't see it coming. One minute he was shaking the couch to wake Jack up, and the next Jack was up and behind him in less than two seconds – murder burning in his eyes – as he grabbed Mac's left arm roughly and flipped him backward over Jack's shoulder.

Mac felt several things happen all at once. The first was his shoulder immediately dislocating, the second was his head smacking against the hardwood floor, and the third was Jack straddling his waist and wrapping his strong, calloused hands around his throat.

Mac's eyes went wide when he realized he couldn't breathe, that Jack's hands were trained to kill, and if Mac didn't do something he was going to die and Jack would never be able to forgive himself.

"J'aaahhh" Mac desperately wheezed, his legs kicking out, trying to find purchase. His left arm wouldn't move but his right could and he used it to pull at Jack's hands.

"You killed little kids," Jack seethed, absolutely no recognition in his eyes. Mac could feel his pulse exploding in his temples, his face growing red at the insane amount of pressure on his windpipe.

"You bastard, they were little kids!"

Mac couldn't believe what was happening. They had just gotten Jack back. Their family was whole again and Jack was about to kill Mac with his bare hands. Mac's legs twitched helplessly as his body started losing consciousness. He couldn't pass out; if he lost consciousness he would never wake up again.

"JACK, STOP!" Mac distantly heard and suddenly a frying pan connected with the side of Jack's head and he fell sideways, releasing the grip he had on Mac's throat instantly.

Mac curled onto his right side, coughing and wheezing harshly as oxygen finally started flowing back into his starving lungs. His neck felt swollen and every movement, every cough and breath of air hurt like knives down his throat.

"Mac!"

Mac could feel Bozer's hands on him, trying to help but not knowing where to begin, and wheezed again.

"Talk to me, Mac, say something!" Bozer's voice was growing more and more hysterical and Mac tried to swallow, to drag enough air in to answer him.

"H'hh ohk'kehh?" Mac forced out. "J'aahk?"

"I don't know," Bozer said, his voice higher than normal. "He was killing you, why was he doing that?"

"N'nighh," Mac broke off in another choking coughing fit and tried to roll onto his other side, to see where Jack was but his shoulder ignited into hot bursts of pain when he tried.

"Hey, just stay still, okay." Bozer told him. "I'll check on Jack."

"Jack, wake up." Mac heard Bozer and willed Jack respond, to show any kind of evidence that Bozer hadn't done any permanent damage in trying to save him.

"What? Bozer, where?" Jack jolted upright, confusion and shock making his accent stronger than normal. "Where's Mac?"

Mac heard the exact moment Jack saw him. The tight gasp was followed by frantic movement and then Jack was there, leaning into Mac's eye line. His face was hazy, pale and worried. Mac reached out a hand and Jack took it.

"What the hell happened?" Jack yelled, making both Mac and Bozer flinch in response. Jack winced as he reached a tentative hand toward Mac's throat, where he was sure there were Jacks' handprints imprinted in the bruised flesh on Mac's neck.

"You were having a nightmare." Bozer said angrily. "You almost killed him."

"No," Jack exhaled sharply, his face paling even more as his eyes flashed from Mac back to Bozer. "I didn't, I wouldn't…"

"It's 'kay," Mac said. He could see the guilt flooding Jack's face already as it sunk in how close he had actually come to killing his best friend. Mac knew it wasn't his fault, though. He had been careful but he should have been even more cautious than he was. He didn't know what Jack had faced on the Kovacs mission; he shouldn't have assumed their normal methods would work.

"I almost killed you." Jack said incredulously, it didn't sound real. There was no way. "I could have killed you."

Mac wanted to reassure Jack, tell him everything was okay and he didn't blame the older man for having a reaction he had no control over, but Jack reached out again and his hand landed on Mac's bad shoulder and Mac couldn't stop the hoarse scream that escaped. It was all suddenly too much for his body to take and he felt himself fading rapidly into the cold, dark embrace of unconsciousness.

"Boz, call an ambulance, now!" Mac heard Jack's frantic voice as it filtered through his consciousness before the buzzing in his ears took over and he was aware no more.

Mac could feel the hard plastic of a c-collar around his neck when finally woke up again. He was in a brightly lit room that had a strong antiseptic, sterile smell and a monotonous beeping sound someone near his bed and he knew immediately that he was in the hospital, or Phoenix medical. He didn't really care.

All he cared about was the fact that Jack was sitting beside him, his elbows on the bed as he rested his chin on his laced together fingers. Jack was watching him with so much guilt, so much worry, but he was there! He didn't leave!

"Ja-"

"Hey now, don't try to talk. I did a real number on your vocal cords." Jack said softly. Mac frowned; he had to be able to communicate. He wiggled the fingers of his right hand and when Jack looked down he mimed writing with something.

"Yeah, that'll work." Jack said, taking a pad of paper and pen off of a little tray table by his bedside and putting it under Mac's hand. Clearly, it was anticipated that Mac would want to talk. Mac scribbled something and then tapped the paper with the pen.

**NOT YOUR FAULT**

"I could have killed you, Mac." Jack said, not taking his eyes off the messy writing. Mac grabbed the pad back from Jack.

**YOU DIDNT **

"Only because Bozer stopped me, man. If he didn't get there in time…"

**WOULD HAVE STOPD**

"You can't know that, bud, I don't know if I would have."

**TRUST YOU COMPLTLY**

Mac started determinedly at Jack and watched as the older man's face crumpled. He lifted his entwined fists back to his face as horror at what could have happened washed over expression. Mac simply wrote two words down and held the paper up for Jack to see.

**FORGIVE YOU**

Jack took the notebook from Mac's shaky hand and Mac placed the newly freed hand on his own chest.

"I for'give you." He breathed, the words barely above a whisper.

"After what I've done I don't deserve it but thank you, kid." Jack whispered back. Mac smiled sadly and then tapped the notebook with his fingers before reaching his unsteady hand toward Jack's chest.

Jack felt a tidal wave of emotion in that moment. He felt the phantom grief and loss and guilt of what could have happened along with the overwhelming relief that Mac was still with them and forgave him so easily. He read Mac's last message loud and clear, too, and he didn't know what he did in his life to deserve such an amazing kid.

Mac had forgiven him, now he had to learn how to forgive himself.

"I'll try, bud. Why don't you get some rest?" Jack said and grabbed onto Mac's searching hand. He squeezed the fingers reassuringly and felt Mac squeeze back.

"Ss'tay," Mac's hoarse voice was almost non-existent but Jack heard the words and knew deep down that he could never leave him again.

"I will, bud, I promise."

Mac fell asleep easily after that.

**The End.**

Oof, that one was emotionally exhausting to write! I hope that's what you had in mind, I'm so sorry if it isn't – but I hope it's okay anyway! Thank you so much for the prompt, it was fun! I am definitely going to get to the other prompts as well, don't worry! :D


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